Making Failure Harder Work Than Passing Chemistry seems to inspire a "D" mentality. A significant number of students just want to pass the class, meet their graduation requirement, and do it with as little effort as possible. Take Evelyn, for example, a junior in my chemistry class last term. Evelyn is a bright young lady, but she didn't see chemistry as relevant to her present or future, so she kept her head low, didn't engage in the material, missed about 20 percent of the class, and seemed to target a grade of 60 percent. That was at the beginning of the class. By the end of the term, Evelyn was sitting in the front row, volunteering to demonstrate how to solve problems, and getting frustrated with herself when her final grade in the class was a "B." Evelyn's grade had gone from a 60 percent to an 85 percent, but the real changes that I saw in her were much more rewarding than an improved grade point average. Many students will avoid working hard in a class that they see as challenging because of the risk involved.
edutopia In the ever-changing demands of today's economy, even children with a solid knowledge base in reading, writing, math, and science are not guaranteed a stable career for the rest of their lives. In addition, an increasing number of graduates will have to create their own jobs. How can teachers foster the creativity, entrepreneurialism, and lifelong curiosity necessary for young people to thrive? Tools in the Hands of Children Brent Hutcheson and his team at Hands On Technologies wanted to see if putting tools into the hands of children could make a difference under adverse conditions in the township of Atteridgeville, South Africa. Children were far more engaged when they had hands-on tools that helped them develop their own understanding of the concepts being taught in both science and language subjects. The Radical Model Villa Monte is a government-approved "school" in Switzerland that is just reviewing its 30-year history. Children learn at their own pace. Children as Entrepreneurs 1. 2.
Focus on the Process and Results Will Follow As I explored the correlation between great coaching and great teaching while interviewing highly successful sports coaches for a book about what teachers can learn from them, a common theme surfaced repeatedly. Several coaches stressed the importance of emphasizing the process rather than the results. This approach may seem counterintuitive, especially given the unprecedented emphasis on testing and performance in education today. However, the process-oriented approach to teaching and learning falls in line nicely with classroom instructional goals such as growth mindset and mastery. Because teachers are generally compliant, they will work diligently to produce the scores and performance that states, districts, and school leadership demand. Perhaps, though, teachers need more leaders who can help emphasize the process in teaching and learning while de-emphasizing the performance. The Problem A Potential Solution Benefits of Emphasizing the Process
edutopia Editor's note: Laura White, a preschool autism teacher and former manager of Ashoka's Changemaker Schools Network, is the co-author of this post. Teacher-researchers, design-thinkers, teacherpreneurs. . . Educators of all types have the potential to exercise their creativity, collaboration, and playfulness to improve education. When devising strategies to make education work for the 21st century, it's natural to think first about students. Tempting as it is to put children at the center of all our education decisions, we must not start there. Here are some examples of identities that teachers have assumed in Ashoka Changemaker Schools that empower them to restructure learning. Teacher-Researchers The Opal School of the Portland (Oregon) Children's Museum honors the challenge of re-imagining teaching and learning by considering all teachers to be teacher-researchers. Opal School teacher-researchers strive to maintain a curiosity that keeps their learning community vital. Design Thinkers
The Making of an Expert Thirty years ago, two Hungarian educators, László and Klara Polgár, decided to challenge the popular assumption that women don’t succeed in areas requiring spatial thinking, such as chess. They wanted to make a point about the power of education. The Polgárs homeschooled their three daughters, and as part of their education the girls started playing chess with their parents at a very young age. Their systematic training and daily practice paid off. It’s not only assumptions about gender differences in expertise that have started to crumble. So what does correlate with success? Consistently and overwhelmingly, the evidence showed that experts are always made, not born. The journey to truly superior performance is neither for the faint of heart nor for the impatient. Let’s begin our story with a little wine. What Is an Expert? In 1976, a fascinating event referred to as the “Judgment of Paris” took place. Two assumptions were challenged that day. Practice Deliberately Why does this happen?
edutopia What if we could dramatically improve our thought processes and learning strategies by tapping into the social genius of another? What if a classmate, colleague, or friend could help us recognize and claim our strengths, new habits of thought, and strategies from a perspective that we never imagined by ourselves? As human beings, our survival depends on others. Our ability to cooperate and collaborate has trumped the stress response state of competition within our species and throughout evolution. Ushering in the Conceptual Age The two aspects of being human that set us apart from other mammals are metacognition and the deep desire to belong or feel felt. Feeling the emotions of others, social acceptance, and cooperation are critical to our early development of the identity and industry stages. Design to change the world in significant ways Story or narrative skills focused on understanding Symphony and synthesis Empathy Play The pursuit of meaning 1. 2. 3. 4.
WOOP to and through college Wish What is your most important academic Wish or concern? Pick a Wish that is challenging for you but that you can fulfill. Note your Wish in 3-6 words! Outcome What would be the best thing, the best Outcome about fulfilling your Wish? Note your best Outcome in 3-6 words! Now take a moment and imagine this best Outcome. Obstacle Sometimes things don‘t work out as we would like. Note your main Obstacle in 3-6 words! Now take a moment and imagine your main Obstacle. Plan What can you do to overcome your Obstacle? Think about it: When and where will the obstacle occur the next time? Make the following Plan: If… (Obstacle), Then I will …(action) If... Then... Copyright © 2014 Gabriele Oettingen.
edutopia E.B. White famously quipped, "Humor can be dissected, as a frog can, but the thing dies in the process." At the risk of committing some sort of "humor-cide," a type of scientific dissection must take place if teachers are to consider harnessing the powerful effects of humor, not only to increase joy and enhance the classroom environment, but also to improve learner outcomes. The Funny Bone Is Connected to the Sense of Wonder Teachers understand that humor is inherently social. Essentially, humor activates our sense of wonder, which is where learning begins, so it seems logical that humor could enhance retention. A substantial body of research explains why we remember things that make us laugh, such as our favorite, hilarious high school moment or the details of that funny movie we saw last weekend. Foolishness as a Tool What does "correctly used" mean? "According to recent surveys, 51 percent of the people are in the majority.” Age-Appropriate Humor Do Avoid About That Frog. . .
Wire Side Chats: How Can Teachers Develop Students' Motivation -- and Success? What can teachers do to help develop students who will face challenges rather than be overwhelmed by them? Why is it that many students seem to fall apart when they get to junior high or middle school? Can the "gifted" label do more harm than good? Carol S. Dweck shares with Education World readers some of her thoughts about the role of motivation in learning. Education World: Some students are mastery-oriented; they readily seek challenges and pour effort into them. Carol Dweck: This is a really interesting question, and the answer is surprising. This is something that really intrigued me from the beginning. EW: What can teachers do to help develop mastery-oriented students -- students who will face a challenge rather than be overwhelmed by it? Dweck: Students who are mastery-oriented think about learning, not about proving how smart they are. When students fail, teachers should also give feedback about effort or strategies -- what the student did wrong and what he or she could do now.
edutopia “But why do I have to go? School is not fun!” That quote is from a first-grade child, asking his mom why he has to go every single day to this place that he was told was going to be a lot of fun, but has not lived up to the hype. If he could articulate further, he might say, "I am only six. I like to have fun, but school is not fun and from what I can tell, it's going to get worse every year, not better." This is not an April Fool's Day anecdote; it's all too real. Confused? I asked Ed how humor can be fit in when teachers have so much to cover in their classes. "But most of all, it brings a sense of pleasure and appreciation and creates a common, positive emotional experience that the students share with each other and the teacher." Humor Strategies to Use Even if you are what Ed calls "humor challenged," there are things you can do to lighten the load and dissipate the clouds in your classroom. Truth be told, however, there is another side to the story.
Grading for Mastery and Redesigning My Gradebook For the last two years, I’ve been increasingly frustrated with the traditional approach to assessing students and reporting grades. I want my students to value learning, not the accumulation of points. Unfortunately, I feel like school is akin to a Pacman game where students are myopically focused on gobbling up points and, as a result, miss the point of learning entirely. Redesigning My Gradebook This year I decided to overhaul my gradebook and assess students based on their mastery of particular skills, also referred to as standards-based grading. Instead of organizing my gradebook using traditional categories (e.g. homework, classwork, projects, tests, and projects), I identified the main skills we would be focusing on developing in this class and used those to create my gradebook categories. Last Year This Year Don’t Grade Everything In the past, students received points for almost every activity they completed in class. Entering Grades in Relation to Specific Skills
edutopia One need not look to superstars such as Mark Zuckerberg or Bill Gates to justify reasons for using code and programming logic in the classroom. There's plenty of literature that illustrates its positive learning outcomes. Coding in the classroom is linked to improved problem solving and analytical reasoning, and students who develop a mastery of coding have a "natural ability and drive to construct, hypothesize, explore, experiment, evaluate, and draw conclusions." But there are other compelling reasons for integrating code in the classroom. Reasons to Teach Coding 1. Wired Magazine reported that reading and writing code is the new literacy. 2. Coding in the classroom is a means of bridging the digital divide. 3. Temple Grandin, author and professor at Colorado State University and an autistic adult, said, "Without the gifts of autism, there would probably be no NASA or IT industry." Knowing there are programs for kids with ASD is good news for parents who shoulder the responsibility. 4.